


Love Letters

by ClockworkDinosaur



Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/F, Fluff, Vrisrezi is mentioned too
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-31
Updated: 2016-08-31
Packaged: 2018-08-12 05:44:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,222
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7922767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClockworkDinosaur/pseuds/ClockworkDinosaur
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rose has no idea how to read Alternian.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love Letters

**Author's Note:**

> I promise one day I'll write something other than Homestuck again, or at least a different paring. 
> 
> One day, not today though.

The bare room that had been converted to a library on the meteor was quiet. Rose and Kanaya sat around a large table, chairs close and large books open in front of them, the papers and pens spread around them taking up the entire table. Kanaya wrote furiously in a large tome of yellowed pages, her letters neat and precise in jade-green ink.

At least, Rose assumed her letters were neat. She still couldn't read Alternian, and the alien letters were completely illegible to her. She wrote in her own notebook, only occasionally looking at Kanaya's lines of text when she seemed to pause.

Kanaya giggled, and Rose looked up from her own writing at her with eyebrows raised.

“What are you writing that's so funny?”

“You can't read Alternian, can you?” Kanaya asked.

“I've been meaning to learn...” said Rose with a shrug. “It _is_ identical to the English language with a few different words and a different alphabet, it can't be too difficult to learn. I just haven't had the time to be taught.”

“Yes, Alternian is pretty much identical to your human English in all but written word,” she said. “Would you like to learn our alphabet?”

Rose nodded, grabbing a lavender pen and turning to a blank page as Kanaya turned to a blank page in her own. “I am your eager pupil, bestow upon me your knowledge, Miss Maryam.”

“Only if you don't call me _Miss Maryam_ ever again,” Kanaya laughed. “Okay, we'll start somewhere simple,” she said, writing four letters down with clean lines and dots. “This is your name.”

Rose studied the letters, copying them slowly in her notebook. “How does this look?”

Kanaya bit her lip. “Well... it's better than most wigglers!” she said encouragingly. “Your lines are a bit too thick here, and your-”

Her constructive criticism was interrupted by a _tsk_ behind the two and a sudden weight over both of their shoulders.

“Jegus, did Terezi write that?” Vriska cackled, her arms around Rose and Kanaya as she leaned forward and studied Rose's notebook. “Wait- that's unfair to Terezi, her handwriting is waaaaaaaay better than that scribble. And she's blind!”

“Yes, I understood your insult, you didn't need to clarify,” Rose deadpanned.

“Oh look, Vriska is here as usual, butting in and being loud,” Kanaya sighed. “If you aren't going to be helpful, could you please go somewhere else?”

“Okay!” Vriska said, making her way to a seat against the wall. “I'm over here now, do whatever.”

Kanaya closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Okay. Let's start by writing each letter. Your name starts with a human _R_ , which translates to this,” she said as she wrote down the symbol.

“Why do you know both the human Latin alphabet and your Alternian alphabet?” Rose asked, copying Kanaya's letter.

“We needed to know your alphabet first to contact you on Trollian, but later Sgrub itself seemed to use it as well so our knowledge proved itself useful,” she said, watching Rose write. “That's much better than your first attempt!”

“Why thank you,” Rose said. “Maybe once I get a hang of this one letter, I'll actually be able to learn the whole alphabet.”

“That almost sounded insincere, but I'll take it as encouragement to continue.” She wrote the next letter of Rose's name and Rose copied it down, earning a grin from Kanaya.

“You're a quick learner! Lets move on to other letters...”

The next hour was spent with Rose copying letters and writing words that increased in difficulty as they went on. Impressed, Kanaya noticed that Rose's handwriting was quickly improving to her level, and she had considered her handwriting to be almost unnecessarily precise and neat.

“Okay,” Kanaya said as she wrote, “read this.” She slid the book to Rose, the Alternian letters written in jade ink now almost as familiar to Rose as English.

“Rose, you look absolutely radiant today,” she read aloud, blood rushing to her face as she looked at Kanaya, who looked back with a wink.

“Now I can give you sappy notes in two alphabets,” she said softly.

“UUUUUUUUGH,” Vriska groaned, making her presence known for the first time in a while. “First this was boring, now it's just gross!”

“You would do the same thing for Terezi and you know it. When you two are off on your own you can get positively sickening to hear,” Kanaya pointed out.

“I mean, yeah, but... it's different.” She sat up straighter and glared at Kanaya. “Wait, how do you know how Terezi and I are?”

Kanaya's eyes widened. “I overheard you two by chance.”

“Sure, right. You're so nosy! Why don't you mind your own business,” Vriska said, crossing her arms.

“Says the one who has been present for the past four of our private dates,” Rose said.

Vriska was silent for a moment. “I don't have to deal with this,” she said, standing and tossing her long black hair over her shoulder before storming from the room.

“How dramatic,” Rose said. She turned back to Kanaya as she rolled her eyes. “So what were you writing before?” she asked, looking at the old blank book Kanaya had pushed aside. Kanaya pushed the book away with an innocent expression.

“Nothing important,” she said.

“What is it?” Rose said, drawing out the words as she reached for the book. Kanaya pushed it further away as she began blushing furiously.

“It-it's nothing!” she cried, but Rose was basically sitting on her lap at that point and managed to pull the book close to her. With a triumphant expression, Rose made herself comfortable while sitting on Kanaya, who hid her face in her hands.

“ _I wonder if Rose knows how lovely she is while she's focused on writing,_ ” Rose read out loud, doing her best to imitate Kanaya's voice.

“I hope I die right now immediately; where are the culling drones when I need them?” Kanaya muttered.

“ _I'm trying to look busy because she does, but she's stunning and it's very hard to focus. If I just write out these flushed feelings perhaps I can leave her alone to continue what she's doing without interruption,_ ” Rose continued. “In all honestly I'd much rather you distract me than leave me alone to write, you're much more interesting than any story about wizards,” she said. Kanaya only shook her head, face still covered but her bright jade blush visible between her fingers

“ _She's glancing at my page every so often. Hello Rose. Can you read what I'm writing? Do you know how beautiful you are and how much I love you?_ ” Rose paused, flustered. Kanaya took the opportunity to grab the notebook away from Rose. She didn't protest, looking at Kanaya with a soft smile.

“I have no explanation aside from the fact I am very sappy and I love you a lot so please do not ask me to explain,” Kanaya said quickly. Rose wrapped her arms around Kanaya's neck and hugged her close.

“I won't ask for an explanation, as long as you don't ask what sort of things I've written about you.” She stood and left Kanaya dumbfounded.

“Unfair! You know what I wrote, I should know what you've written!”

Rose only winked, gathering her notebooks before heading to her room and leaving Kanaya flustered and pouting.

 


End file.
